(2 of 3)
So it goes with the Landmark, a publication whose revenues are as idiosyncratic as the interests of its editor, who does not give out figures except to say he has $100,000 invested in the thing. But what it loses in making money, he offers, it gains in making waves. Last year, for example, Windsor's big campaign was to win accreditation to cover University of North Carolina football games. The university claimed the press box was full. Windsor charged discrimination against small newspapers and covered the games from outside the stadium, until he got an invitation from Chancellor Christopher Fordham to cover the Thanksgiving game from the president's box. In the middle of his account (look up, reader, for a Holstein is about to drop), Windsor wrote: "I was probably the only person at the game that day who had been kissed by a cow. Early that morning I walked to the barn . . . and as I put a bucket of sweet feed over the fence, Chocolate, my big, black and beautiful cow that I used to carry everywhere in my arms, gave me a big lick on the cheek. Jesus don't love souls anymore than I love that cow."
When the Chatham County commission refused to let him place his tape recorder on its meeting table, Windsor raced home and fetched in his own little French provincial table and parked the tape recorder there. After that, the machine was allowed to rest on the commission's table.
This year Windsor has gone after the Raleigh News & Observer for what he considers to be the paper's efforts to damage Lieutenant Governor James Green politically. When the capital paper pointed out that the state was paying for a private bathroom in the Lieutenant Governor's office, the country paper took a picture of the bathroom and published it. "I was ready to see a 30-ft.-sq. bath with sunken marble tub and gold fixtures, similar to the Roman baths," Windsor wrote. "What I found was a tiny room about 5 ft. by 7 ft. with a plain white lavatory and plain white tub, a toilet paper holder that does not work, and that is all. There is not a filling station in Orange or Chatham County that does not have a better bathroom. It is plainer than an old shoe." Beyond that, the Landmark went on to insinuate that the management of the News & Observer has been known to "push biddies in the creek." Windsor admits he made up this heinous crime, drowning chicks, but says he was sore.
In the region, these salvos appear to be met by bemusement more than anything else. There are journalism professors here who say the Landmark is a personal journal more than a newspaper and should be savored as one man's meat. Brent Hackney, the Governor's press secretary, calls Windsor "Hunter Thompson in bib overalls." And the cable television channel in Chapel Hill has given Windsor a 30-minute talk show on Friday nights, such is his newfound popularity.